__NOTOC__ The British National Vegetation Classification or NVC is a system of classifying natural

habitat In ecology, habitat refers to the array of resources, biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species' habitat can be seen as the physical manifestation of its ...

types in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...

according to the

vegetation Vegetation is an assemblage of plants and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular Taxon, taxa, life forms, structure, Spatial ecology, spatial extent, or any other specific Botany, botanic ...

they contain. A large scientific meeting of ecologists,

botanist Botany, also called plant science, is the branch of natural science and biology studying plants, especially Plant anatomy, their anatomy, Plant taxonomy, taxonomy, and Plant ecology, ecology. A botanist or plant scientist is a scientist who s ...

s, and other related professionals in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

resulted in the publication of a compendium of five books: '' British Plant Communities'', edited by John S. Rodwell, which detail the incidence of plant species in twelve major habitat types in the British

natural environment The natural environment or natural world encompasses all life, biotic and abiotic component, abiotic things occurring nature, naturally, meaning in this case not artificiality, artificial. The term is most often applied to Earth or some parts ...

. They are the first systematic and comprehensive account of the

types of the country. They cover all natural, semi-natural and major artificial habitats in Great Britain (not

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ; ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, part of the United Kingdom in the north-east of the island of Ireland. It has been #Descriptions, variously described as a country, province or region. Northern Ireland shares Repub ...

) and represent fifteen years of research by leading plant ecologists. From the data collated from the books, commercial

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

products have been developed to help to classify vegetation identified into one of the many habitat types found in Great Britain – these include ''MATCH'', ''TABLEFIT'' and ''MAVIS''.

Terminology

The following are lists of terms used in connection with the British National Vegetation Classification, together with their meanings.

Communities, subcommunities and variants

*A community is the fundamental unit of categorisation for vegetation. *A subcommunity is a distinct recognisable subdivision of a community. *A variant is a further subdivision of a subcommunity.

Constant species

*A constant species in a community is a species that is always present in any given stand of vegetation belonging to that community. For a list of the constant species, and the NVC communities in which they are present, see List of constant species in the British National Vegetation Classification.

Rare species

*A rare species is a species which is associated with a particular community and is rare nationally. :The sources used by the authors of '' British Plant Communities'' for assessing rarity were as follows. :a) for

vascular plant Vascular plants (), also called tracheophytes (, ) or collectively tracheophyta (; ), are plants that have lignin, lignified tissues (the xylem) for conducting water and minerals throughout the plant. They also have a specialized non-lignified Ti ...

s, two sources were used: ::*Perring, F. H. and S. M. Walters (1962) '' Atlas of the British Flora'' – a species was regarded as rare if it was given an "A" rating in this work (these were plants which Perring & Walters judged to be sufficiently rare to merit a special search in order to ensure all records were included in the atlas). ::*Any species included on lists compiled by the Nature Conservancy Council of plants found in less than 100 hectads. :b) for

bryophyte Bryophytes () are a group of embryophyte, land plants (embryophytes), sometimes treated as a taxonomic Division (taxonomy), division referred to as Bryophyta ''Sensu#Common qualifiers, sensu lato'', that contains three groups of non-vascular pla ...

s, the source used was Corley, M. F. V. and M. O. Hill (1981) ''Distribution of bryophytes in the British Isles''. This lists the species and the vice-counties in which they are recorded; presence in under 20 vice-counties was the criterion used for selection as rare. :c) for

lichen A lichen ( , ) is a hybrid colony (biology), colony of algae or cyanobacteria living symbiotically among hypha, filaments of multiple fungus species, along with yeasts and bacteria embedded in the cortex or "skin", in a mutualism (biology), m ...

s, no source was available, and the authors used their own selection of species. For a list of these rare species, and the NVC communities in which they are present, see List of rare species in the British National Vegetation Classification.

Communities by category

In total there are 286 communities in the British National Vegetation Classification. They are grouped into the following major categories: * Woodland and scrub communities (25 communities, prefixed with the letter "W" — 19 classed as woodland, four as scrub and two as 'underscrub') * Mires (38 communities, prefixed "M") * Heaths (22 communities, prefixed "H") * Mesotrophic grasslands (13 communities, prefixed "MG") * Calcicolous grasslands (14 communities, prefixed "CG") * Calcifugous grasslands and montane communities (21 communities, prefixed "U") * Aquatic communities (24 communities, prefixed "A") * Swamps and tall-herb fens (28 communities, prefixed "S") * Salt-marsh communities (28 communities, prefixed "SM") * Shingle, strandline and sand-dune communities (19 communities, prefixed "SD" — one shingle, two strandline and 16 sand-dune communities) * Maritime cliff communities (12 communities, prefixed "MC") * Vegetation of open habitats (42 communities, prefixed "OV") A full list of these communities, grouped into the above categories, can be found at List of plant communities in the British National Vegetation Classification.

References

{{NVC Biota by conservation status system Conservation in the United Kingdom Metadata standards